Would you be shocked if I told you I had some plumbing problems recently? You would? HAVE YOU EVER READ THIS STUPID BLOG? If I'm not fixing plumbing, I'm killing plants or complaining about the roof leak.
My first bout of a plumbing flareup happened a couple of months ago. My toilet started leaking! PANIC!!! POOH EVERYWHERE!!! Oh wait...the leak was coming from the tank, not the bowl. Phew. Ok, not pooh everywhere, just some inconvenient water drips each time I flushed from the clean water in the tank. Thank goodness for backup bathroom a la the guest wing. The kind folks at the home warranty sanctioned plumbers came to town, brought me a brand new toilet for a slightly upgraded price, and tada! I have a throne that only my bum has christened.
Next plumbing issue: the mini sink in the kitchen. Why do I have two sinks in my kitchen? There's a regular sized one and a little mini one situated right beside the stove. I guess some people use it to fill up pots or do things while they are cooking that benefit from the proximity of a mini sink. Me? I don't cook. I don't need a mini sink. It has become the sink I use to fill the dogs' water bowls simply because it's 5 steps closer than the regular sink. So I now have a human sink and a dog water sink. Oh lala.
Mini sink started dripping a few weeks ago. I turned the knob harder, and it stopped. Then, the leak started again. I turned the knob even harder, and it slowed slightly but still dripped. Being the busy executive that I am (hahaha), I didn't have time to put in the home warranty repair request right away, so the leak got faster and faster until one day I woke up to a solid stream of water coming out of the faucet. Uh oh. What have I done? If I lived in California, I would have gone to prison for the rest of my life for going over my water allotment. It was time to get serious about getting a plumber, and I was also going to shut that whole sink off at the valve underneath....or so I thought. Like a fool. A stupid, stupid fool.
The shut-off valve under a sink is a pretty great idea if you ask me. You want to stop the flow of water past that point, you turn off the valve. Voila! There's one for hot water and one for cold water. When I went to turn off my valve, water started spraying everywhere....ssspprraaayyyyyy aaaaaaaaaaaaaa. How unusual. The shut off valve wasn't shutting off, it was opening up a torrential flow of water that poured into my kitchen. I opened the valve back up to stop the spray, and the water went back to running in a thin trickle out of the faucet. I was stuck with the leak that was eroding wetlands and draining rivers, streams, and lakes of precious resources.
The next day the plumbers arrived and discovered the part needed to fix the sink wasn't one of the standard parts that they had conveniently packed in the truck. Nope. It was an unusual part that can only be obtained from a mining operation run on the planet Mars. After a quick trip (an hour round-trip from my house) to both Ace and Home Depot, a repair kit was secured in lieu of having the fully new piece.
And the shut-off valve? The plumber said that I stopped turning too soon. "Why, what do you mean, sir? I stopped turning when water started pouring out of the valve." Evidently, shut-off valves are now designed to be like some sort of physical challenge where you have to reach what you think is the breaking point and then PUSH THROUGH to victory.
Have you hit mile 50 on your ultra-marathon and think you won't make it to the finish line at mile 75? Keep going past the pain and the panic. That's how you have to approach my shut-off valve. Now I know.
On the bright side, I have a guy coming to deal with the roof leak next week and to fix some drywall that fell victim to said roof leak and to patch the drywall hole I cut in the wall when I rescued the baby kittens a few years ago. So that's all positive and stuff, right? The best news is that monsoon season has arrived, so it's supposed to rain every single day between now and the day the roof folks come. I love home ownership.
Friday, June 26, 2015
Monday, March 16, 2015
What's that, you say? Where Have I Been?
Oh my gawd, ya'll! I have a blawg! *blush* So, yeah. I took two years off. What are you gonna do about it? Sue me? I can say I was doing hard time for assault and battery, I took time off to dabble in Scientology, or I was so overwhelmed with my home business of knitting pen holders that it has taken me two years to catch up and hire a team of knitters to help build my empire, but that would all be false. Falsey false false. I have just been a procrastinating laze bag of procrastination and laziness.
I was reading my last post from March 2013 and had to laugh. It talked about the desire to buy plants and make the yard pretty and do all kinds of projects to have an amazing garden of joy and delight. I was JUST doing this over the weekend. "Ohhhhh. I do so love some flowers. Allison, let's buy flowers," I told myself. "I SWEAR I'll be better this year. I DOUBLE SWEAR I will water the plants and love them and tend to them like they were the baby Jesus come to take us all to heaven."
The reason I didn't post on my blog in March 2014 was because I was doing all those things! I planted 18 roses, other assorted flowers, some decorative grasses, and a hibiscus. Oh man, the hibiscus was a beauty! I was Allison Green Thumb. I officially turned over a new leaf. I was singing and the birds were chirping happily around my head and landing on my shoulders in song and shit. La la la....tra la la la la.
The reason I didn't post in September of 2014 was because I was busy pulling out all the plants I had killed since March. How many years do I have to do this to myself? I could have retired and purchased an island in the Caribbean for what I've spent on plants that ultimately die once they cross my property boundary.
In other news, my roof leaks. So yeah....that's cool. Owning a house is awesome, and by awesome I mean it sucks all the joy out of living. This year I'm spending plant money on roof repair and drywall fixins. Maybe that's how the universe is trying to intervene to save all the helpless little plants I would have killed this year.
I was reading my last post from March 2013 and had to laugh. It talked about the desire to buy plants and make the yard pretty and do all kinds of projects to have an amazing garden of joy and delight. I was JUST doing this over the weekend. "Ohhhhh. I do so love some flowers. Allison, let's buy flowers," I told myself. "I SWEAR I'll be better this year. I DOUBLE SWEAR I will water the plants and love them and tend to them like they were the baby Jesus come to take us all to heaven."
The reason I didn't post on my blog in March 2014 was because I was doing all those things! I planted 18 roses, other assorted flowers, some decorative grasses, and a hibiscus. Oh man, the hibiscus was a beauty! I was Allison Green Thumb. I officially turned over a new leaf. I was singing and the birds were chirping happily around my head and landing on my shoulders in song and shit. La la la....tra la la la la.
The reason I didn't post in September of 2014 was because I was busy pulling out all the plants I had killed since March. How many years do I have to do this to myself? I could have retired and purchased an island in the Caribbean for what I've spent on plants that ultimately die once they cross my property boundary.
In other news, my roof leaks. So yeah....that's cool. Owning a house is awesome, and by awesome I mean it sucks all the joy out of living. This year I'm spending plant money on roof repair and drywall fixins. Maybe that's how the universe is trying to intervene to save all the helpless little plants I would have killed this year.
Monday, March 11, 2013
Spring is Almost Here
The weather started to turn today, and this week is going to be in the 80's. In my mind, that means spring is on the way. I also know it's almost spring because I have this desire to buy a bunch of plants and turn my yard into a flowering wonderland of joy and beauty. Roses, blooming things, trees, bushes, you name it, I want to plant it. I want a greenhouse and climbing vines over a lovely archway and beautiful pots scattered around the yard with the most amazing plants spilling over the sides. I want lush beds of plants with nice flowers that last all summer. I want waterfalls and ponds and lilies and shade and hammocks. I want raised beds with tomatoes and half-runner green beans and peppers.
The only problem with all of that is I kill plants. Dead. I am the human version of agent orange. I achieve the same results of dead plants whether I try hard to keep them alive or simply buy them and leave them in the hot sun with no water. It doesn't matter. I killed lavender in one week...sweet peas...9 days. I am either going to kill something with kindness or kill it with neglect. The sooner I learn to embrace this about myself, the sooner I will stop wasting money on plants that will be dead within the week.
The other telltale sign of spring: I want to clean the house and paint and do all kinds of spring-like projects like tear my kitchen apart. OK....I may be willing to admit that I want the inside of the house painted, but I don't really want to be the one to paint it. As for cleaning...well, I guess I could do that sometime soon....maybe next month? And yes, I always want to tear my kitchen apart, but the desire is especially strong in the spring. I imagine cool afternoons with all the windows and doors open as I spend time transforming my kitchen into something light and airy and happy. There would be a touch of blue, maybe a little splash of red, some other colors that are light and clean. I must resist this desire, however, because I will tear the kitchen apart, then summer will arrive and I won't have any desire to do anything in that kitchen to put it back together.
The problem is compounded because I was stuck at home today, sick and achy and miserable. I had lots of time to look around the house and the yard and had this irrational feeling that transforming my yard and house would make me feel better. What is really going to make me feel better: not being sick, winning the lottery, and hearing that Lawry's decided to start making their meatloaf mix again. Those things would make me profoundly happy and are much more in the realm of possibility than the irrational dream that I will be able to plant and maintain a dream garden while accelerating the pace on fixing up my house. Sigh...double sigh. I must be getting feverish from this illness. Time for bed.
The only problem with all of that is I kill plants. Dead. I am the human version of agent orange. I achieve the same results of dead plants whether I try hard to keep them alive or simply buy them and leave them in the hot sun with no water. It doesn't matter. I killed lavender in one week...sweet peas...9 days. I am either going to kill something with kindness or kill it with neglect. The sooner I learn to embrace this about myself, the sooner I will stop wasting money on plants that will be dead within the week.
The other telltale sign of spring: I want to clean the house and paint and do all kinds of spring-like projects like tear my kitchen apart. OK....I may be willing to admit that I want the inside of the house painted, but I don't really want to be the one to paint it. As for cleaning...well, I guess I could do that sometime soon....maybe next month? And yes, I always want to tear my kitchen apart, but the desire is especially strong in the spring. I imagine cool afternoons with all the windows and doors open as I spend time transforming my kitchen into something light and airy and happy. There would be a touch of blue, maybe a little splash of red, some other colors that are light and clean. I must resist this desire, however, because I will tear the kitchen apart, then summer will arrive and I won't have any desire to do anything in that kitchen to put it back together.
The problem is compounded because I was stuck at home today, sick and achy and miserable. I had lots of time to look around the house and the yard and had this irrational feeling that transforming my yard and house would make me feel better. What is really going to make me feel better: not being sick, winning the lottery, and hearing that Lawry's decided to start making their meatloaf mix again. Those things would make me profoundly happy and are much more in the realm of possibility than the irrational dream that I will be able to plant and maintain a dream garden while accelerating the pace on fixing up my house. Sigh...double sigh. I must be getting feverish from this illness. Time for bed.
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
Time Flies when You Are Doing Nothing
I revisited my blog for the first time in over a year. I could tell you the exact amount of time it has been, but actually calculating that out would make me feel like even more of a loser than typing "over a year," so I won't bother with the math. Besides, math isn't my strongest subject. Procrastinating is my strongest subject, which leads me to my latest laundry list of home updates.
The pool. Remember the pool? Well, I'm going to need for you to forget about the pool. The pool is dead to me, just as it should be to you. Here's the thing about a pool....they are a pain in the ass. You heard me. Yes, this is the same girl that loves swimming more than most things on the planet. Having your own pool is a drag. After catching mating frogs, skimming dead mice, and being constantly on the lookout for snakes that decided to backstroke on a warm summer day, I made the decision to get rid of the pool. I'm no slave to a body of water that I use once a year! I won't do it, I tell you. I WON'T do it. (sobs and teeth gnashing)
I would invite you over to see the process, but honestly, it's not pretty. The guys started work this week by tearing down the little pool shed that hid the pump and filter, busting up a stupid curb that the former owners put in for no apparent reason, and also tearing down the fake well. "Why get rid of the fake well?" you might ask. Because it was dumb and fake and falling apart. That's why. It was harshing my mellow, jamming up my backyard flow, and creeping me out with the number of dead lizards that met an early grave by falling in the fake well and being unable to climb back out.
Needless to say, my backyard currently looks like a bombed out city on the edge of a refugee camp of sorrow and despair. They jack hammered a hole in the bottom of the pool for drainage, and threw the debris from the well and the shed into the pool. Not only can you see the gaping hole, but you can also see about a foot worth of rubble. Yes....my yard has rubble...in the pool, beside the pool, near the pool. Rubble for as far as the eye can see. I know you're jealous. You have every right to be because I have RUBBLE and well, you probably don't.
Fortunately, the pool killers will be coming back later this week and filling in the rest of the pool with dirt. Dirt is prettier than rubble. They will also grade part of the yard, fix part of a fence, and haul all the debris away that isn't appropriate for pool filling. I am also taking part of the area that was pool and making a small cement pond with a waterfall. That's right, I am completely changing my landscaping and adding a pond because my dogs will like a pond. Don't you dare laugh, or all three dogs will drive to your house and drop off a load of rubble.
We might have rubble, but we also have central air and heat. By far the coolest thing I have done at the house (literally) in the past year is to put in a heat pump. Central air and heat, I can't quit you. No more piecemeal cooling apparatuses (and that should totally be apparati in my world of English grammar). A heat pump makes Allison a very happy camper. I recommend heating and cooling for all of you. Seriously.
Which leads me to the next project....flooring. Remember when I ripped out all the carpet in my bedroom after the great flood of 2011? And then remember how I moved my bed into the living room for a short while thinking I would slap a new floor down in a jiffy, then said to heck with it and moved the bed back to the concrete slab in my bedroom? Well, you will be happy to know that I still haven't put down new flooring in the bedroom. Not only have I not put down new flooring in the bedroom, but I also ripped out carpet and busted up tile in the "guest" portion of the house. Yeah....I guess the "flooring update" wasn't really an update after all since most would assume that a "flooring update" meant I actually had a professional come and put some kind of floor down. Really, the slab ain't half bad. It's easy to clean, for those people that believe in cleaning, and it's free to keep living on the slab. I like free.
In other news, I think I am just about in the mood to paint the inside of my house. The only things holding me back are: time, the fact that I hate painting, the fact that I don't know how to decorate so I will probably pick insane paint colors, the last remaining shreds of wallpaper borders in the dining room that I don't want to take down because removing wallpaper is like rolling around on broken glass soaked in lemon juice, and the fact that there are some annoying tiles on the kitchen walls that I will want to remove and replace before repainting the kitchen.
Honestly, I can't remove tiles from the kitchen back splash at this juncture because that could end up being another thing I demolish here without any real plans to replace them. Let's face it, people. I am Allison the Destroyer, not Allison the DIY Home Makeover Maven. Maybe 2 or 3 or 5 years from now I will be writing on this blog about how I have almost torn down the entire house and the dogs and I are living in a tent on the concrete slab with central air from our heat pump. It will be like the show "Hoarders: Buried Alive" only in reverse. I NEED AN INTERVENTION! Or to win the lottery, affording me the budget to hire lots of minions to do all the things around here that I could do myself if I weren't so busy procrastinating. Not that I don't like you all, but honestly, I would rather win the lottery than to show up one evening with all of my friends sitting in the living room saying "Allison, we are all here because we love you."
That was all a rather long way of saying I haven't painted inside the house yet because I don't want to have an intervention.
So, those are my general homeowner updates. My list of things to do is still insanely long. If you bought a 12 pack of double roll Charmin, unrolled all the rolls and taped them together into one ginormously long piece of paper, you might have enough room to write my entire to-do list, especially if you write small. Anyone out there like to paint? Feel free to come over and spend some time at the house.
The pool. Remember the pool? Well, I'm going to need for you to forget about the pool. The pool is dead to me, just as it should be to you. Here's the thing about a pool....they are a pain in the ass. You heard me. Yes, this is the same girl that loves swimming more than most things on the planet. Having your own pool is a drag. After catching mating frogs, skimming dead mice, and being constantly on the lookout for snakes that decided to backstroke on a warm summer day, I made the decision to get rid of the pool. I'm no slave to a body of water that I use once a year! I won't do it, I tell you. I WON'T do it. (sobs and teeth gnashing)
I would invite you over to see the process, but honestly, it's not pretty. The guys started work this week by tearing down the little pool shed that hid the pump and filter, busting up a stupid curb that the former owners put in for no apparent reason, and also tearing down the fake well. "Why get rid of the fake well?" you might ask. Because it was dumb and fake and falling apart. That's why. It was harshing my mellow, jamming up my backyard flow, and creeping me out with the number of dead lizards that met an early grave by falling in the fake well and being unable to climb back out.
Needless to say, my backyard currently looks like a bombed out city on the edge of a refugee camp of sorrow and despair. They jack hammered a hole in the bottom of the pool for drainage, and threw the debris from the well and the shed into the pool. Not only can you see the gaping hole, but you can also see about a foot worth of rubble. Yes....my yard has rubble...in the pool, beside the pool, near the pool. Rubble for as far as the eye can see. I know you're jealous. You have every right to be because I have RUBBLE and well, you probably don't.
Fortunately, the pool killers will be coming back later this week and filling in the rest of the pool with dirt. Dirt is prettier than rubble. They will also grade part of the yard, fix part of a fence, and haul all the debris away that isn't appropriate for pool filling. I am also taking part of the area that was pool and making a small cement pond with a waterfall. That's right, I am completely changing my landscaping and adding a pond because my dogs will like a pond. Don't you dare laugh, or all three dogs will drive to your house and drop off a load of rubble.
We might have rubble, but we also have central air and heat. By far the coolest thing I have done at the house (literally) in the past year is to put in a heat pump. Central air and heat, I can't quit you. No more piecemeal cooling apparatuses (and that should totally be apparati in my world of English grammar). A heat pump makes Allison a very happy camper. I recommend heating and cooling for all of you. Seriously.
Which leads me to the next project....flooring. Remember when I ripped out all the carpet in my bedroom after the great flood of 2011? And then remember how I moved my bed into the living room for a short while thinking I would slap a new floor down in a jiffy, then said to heck with it and moved the bed back to the concrete slab in my bedroom? Well, you will be happy to know that I still haven't put down new flooring in the bedroom. Not only have I not put down new flooring in the bedroom, but I also ripped out carpet and busted up tile in the "guest" portion of the house. Yeah....I guess the "flooring update" wasn't really an update after all since most would assume that a "flooring update" meant I actually had a professional come and put some kind of floor down. Really, the slab ain't half bad. It's easy to clean, for those people that believe in cleaning, and it's free to keep living on the slab. I like free.
In other news, I think I am just about in the mood to paint the inside of my house. The only things holding me back are: time, the fact that I hate painting, the fact that I don't know how to decorate so I will probably pick insane paint colors, the last remaining shreds of wallpaper borders in the dining room that I don't want to take down because removing wallpaper is like rolling around on broken glass soaked in lemon juice, and the fact that there are some annoying tiles on the kitchen walls that I will want to remove and replace before repainting the kitchen.
Honestly, I can't remove tiles from the kitchen back splash at this juncture because that could end up being another thing I demolish here without any real plans to replace them. Let's face it, people. I am Allison the Destroyer, not Allison the DIY Home Makeover Maven. Maybe 2 or 3 or 5 years from now I will be writing on this blog about how I have almost torn down the entire house and the dogs and I are living in a tent on the concrete slab with central air from our heat pump. It will be like the show "Hoarders: Buried Alive" only in reverse. I NEED AN INTERVENTION! Or to win the lottery, affording me the budget to hire lots of minions to do all the things around here that I could do myself if I weren't so busy procrastinating. Not that I don't like you all, but honestly, I would rather win the lottery than to show up one evening with all of my friends sitting in the living room saying "Allison, we are all here because we love you."
That was all a rather long way of saying I haven't painted inside the house yet because I don't want to have an intervention.
So, those are my general homeowner updates. My list of things to do is still insanely long. If you bought a 12 pack of double roll Charmin, unrolled all the rolls and taped them together into one ginormously long piece of paper, you might have enough room to write my entire to-do list, especially if you write small. Anyone out there like to paint? Feel free to come over and spend some time at the house.
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Wild Kingdom from Hell
While some things do not survive here, like trees that I manage to kill, other things thrive, like wild animals. The latest addition to my house: a hive of bees. Buzz buzz.
I noticed a a handful of bees flying around outside a few days ago, but they went away. I figured they found my porch a bad location for their condo community. Then I found 50 dead bees in my bathroom yesterday, and a few more in the bedroom today. OH MY GOD! The BEES are IN the HOUSE!!! Once I found the massive die off, I knew it was time to call a professional, as in I am not buying some cans of raid and hunting down this hive myself. No way, no how, hell no, etc..., etc..., etc...
Sound the trumpets, roll out the red carpet, greet the king of extermination as he arrives on his trusty steed to slay the dragon...or the bees. I gave him a quick reenactment of the past few days, including the screams and fake fainting as I demonstrated where I found the dead bees. He checked all around and found a few places he will seal up for future bee prevention, but we didn't find any sign of a hive in the walls.
We did a quick check around part of the outside and discovered a bat (yikes!), a few places where we will do rodent abatement, and not much else. Honestly, the bat became my main concern given that bats are terrifying. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they eat insects. Great. Unless they are going to take out thousands of bees like they are chowing down at the great insect buffet, I'm not interested in having a bat, even if he is only here for a little while before he moves to warmer weather.
Sir Exterminator, the knight of insect destruction, sprayed along the doors and baseboards inside so I could get rid of some of the more benign critters like centipedes, scorpions, and spiders (yes, I did just call all of those horrible things benign...compared to a hive of africanized bees that have dreams at night of killing all happiness in the world, then scorpions become cute, cuddly family pets). We arranged for him to come back tomorrow when he has more time so he could spray and seal up spots outside. Great...napalm the insects. I'm good with that. While you are at it, pack up that bat and take it home with you, dude.
No sooner had he left the house than I noticed some bees strangely flying outside of a window in my bathroom. They weren't there 10 minutes before when the exterminator was here. Sneaky bees. I leaned closer to the glass and looked to the left to find a HUGE HIVE OF BEES LIVING ON MY FREAKING HOUSE ! (cue blood curdling scream).
I called him back and warned him about the hive. What an unlucky surprise that would have been for him walking around outside.... "la la la. I'm walking around outside. la la la AAAAAAAA. I'm covered in bees!" He said he would attack the problem tomorrow. I hope the problem doesn't attack back.
In the meantime, I've been warned that by the morning, my house should look something like an insect slaughterhouse. It seems that all those benign things like scorpions and centipedes will come out tonight, walk across the spray areas, and die. Great. It will only remind me that horrible things creep and crawl around my house while I sleep. WHILE I SLEEP!!!! Do you understand the creep out ramifications of that? I could die.
Even though it has only been a few hours, I have found two spiders...one huge unknown spider and one tarantula. Of course they were both on the counter tops. They must have sensed the spray and moved to higher ground. Only at my house would the spiders outsmart the insect spray. You know what else is located higher than the insect spray along the baseboards? My bed. That's what.
I am itchy and feel like I'm covered in bees and tarantulas and scorpions and bats. What a crazy day.
I noticed a a handful of bees flying around outside a few days ago, but they went away. I figured they found my porch a bad location for their condo community. Then I found 50 dead bees in my bathroom yesterday, and a few more in the bedroom today. OH MY GOD! The BEES are IN the HOUSE!!! Once I found the massive die off, I knew it was time to call a professional, as in I am not buying some cans of raid and hunting down this hive myself. No way, no how, hell no, etc..., etc..., etc...
Sound the trumpets, roll out the red carpet, greet the king of extermination as he arrives on his trusty steed to slay the dragon...or the bees. I gave him a quick reenactment of the past few days, including the screams and fake fainting as I demonstrated where I found the dead bees. He checked all around and found a few places he will seal up for future bee prevention, but we didn't find any sign of a hive in the walls.
We did a quick check around part of the outside and discovered a bat (yikes!), a few places where we will do rodent abatement, and not much else. Honestly, the bat became my main concern given that bats are terrifying. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they eat insects. Great. Unless they are going to take out thousands of bees like they are chowing down at the great insect buffet, I'm not interested in having a bat, even if he is only here for a little while before he moves to warmer weather.
Sir Exterminator, the knight of insect destruction, sprayed along the doors and baseboards inside so I could get rid of some of the more benign critters like centipedes, scorpions, and spiders (yes, I did just call all of those horrible things benign...compared to a hive of africanized bees that have dreams at night of killing all happiness in the world, then scorpions become cute, cuddly family pets). We arranged for him to come back tomorrow when he has more time so he could spray and seal up spots outside. Great...napalm the insects. I'm good with that. While you are at it, pack up that bat and take it home with you, dude.
No sooner had he left the house than I noticed some bees strangely flying outside of a window in my bathroom. They weren't there 10 minutes before when the exterminator was here. Sneaky bees. I leaned closer to the glass and looked to the left to find a HUGE HIVE OF BEES LIVING ON MY FREAKING HOUSE ! (cue blood curdling scream).
I called him back and warned him about the hive. What an unlucky surprise that would have been for him walking around outside.... "la la la. I'm walking around outside. la la la AAAAAAAA. I'm covered in bees!" He said he would attack the problem tomorrow. I hope the problem doesn't attack back.
In the meantime, I've been warned that by the morning, my house should look something like an insect slaughterhouse. It seems that all those benign things like scorpions and centipedes will come out tonight, walk across the spray areas, and die. Great. It will only remind me that horrible things creep and crawl around my house while I sleep. WHILE I SLEEP!!!! Do you understand the creep out ramifications of that? I could die.
Even though it has only been a few hours, I have found two spiders...one huge unknown spider and one tarantula. Of course they were both on the counter tops. They must have sensed the spray and moved to higher ground. Only at my house would the spiders outsmart the insect spray. You know what else is located higher than the insect spray along the baseboards? My bed. That's what.
I am itchy and feel like I'm covered in bees and tarantulas and scorpions and bats. What a crazy day.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
RIP Tree and Other News
A moment of silence for the pine tree mentioned in my previous post........... To ease our period of mourning, Wonder Jim came and cut it down. It is but a memory and a stump in the yard. Now I am tree shopping for something leafy and prone to awesome canopy. I put out a few suggestions to my yard guru, but they were all shot down.
Magnolia? "Allison, those are tricky." Translation: you will kill it.
Maple? "This is not Virginia." Translation: you will kill it.
Cottonwood? "It needs water. Lots of water." Translation: you will kill it.
So on and so forth and so on again. All with the same answer: you will kill it.
So, it looks like I will most likely be getting an Arizona Ash Tree. They are Allison Proof, for the most part, and it isn't yet another mesquite tree of which I have about a million. I'm sure, with minimal effort on my part, I will kill it. Poor thing isn't even purchased yet, and it's already in trouble.
Other news...I bought a leaf blower. For those of you unfamiliar with a leaf blower, it's like a rake for really lazy people. Someone designed a leaf blower just for me. A little known fact about leaf blowers, though, is it does take some skill to actually use the darn thing. If you aren't careful, all the blowing debris and leaves and dirt can actually end up behind you, and that is not the intended result of moving the stuff forward and over the cliff behind my house. Another little known fact...they aren't really as fun to use as one would think. Even so, it's not a rake. For that, I am thankful.
Hmmm...any other house news? Oh, I have done some preliminary calculations, and I have discovered that it is actually impossible to complete home projects, clean a house, do laundry, maintain a pool, keep the yard clean, go to work, walk the dogs, AND still get sleep given the limited amount of time in a day and given our limited amount of time on this earth assuming an average person has a lifespan of 75 years. So, I have decided to stop cleaning. I have eliminated keeping the yard completely clean. I half-ass home projects. I buy new underwear to keep from doing laundry as frequently as before. All of these cuts will still enable me to walk the dogs, work, sleep, and take great naps during the weekend.
Last but not least....I have moved the bed back into the bedroom. No more living room camp outs for me and the dogs. That doesn't mean I have actually put in the new floor. Nope. I am living on the concrete slap. It does mean I got tired of waking up looking at the mountains out the window. I felt like I had a huge hill to climb every single freaking day. Now I look out at the valley. It's all down hill and smooth sailing for me. My psyche thanked me greatly.
Magnolia? "Allison, those are tricky." Translation: you will kill it.
Maple? "This is not Virginia." Translation: you will kill it.
Cottonwood? "It needs water. Lots of water." Translation: you will kill it.
So on and so forth and so on again. All with the same answer: you will kill it.
So, it looks like I will most likely be getting an Arizona Ash Tree. They are Allison Proof, for the most part, and it isn't yet another mesquite tree of which I have about a million. I'm sure, with minimal effort on my part, I will kill it. Poor thing isn't even purchased yet, and it's already in trouble.
Other news...I bought a leaf blower. For those of you unfamiliar with a leaf blower, it's like a rake for really lazy people. Someone designed a leaf blower just for me. A little known fact about leaf blowers, though, is it does take some skill to actually use the darn thing. If you aren't careful, all the blowing debris and leaves and dirt can actually end up behind you, and that is not the intended result of moving the stuff forward and over the cliff behind my house. Another little known fact...they aren't really as fun to use as one would think. Even so, it's not a rake. For that, I am thankful.
Hmmm...any other house news? Oh, I have done some preliminary calculations, and I have discovered that it is actually impossible to complete home projects, clean a house, do laundry, maintain a pool, keep the yard clean, go to work, walk the dogs, AND still get sleep given the limited amount of time in a day and given our limited amount of time on this earth assuming an average person has a lifespan of 75 years. So, I have decided to stop cleaning. I have eliminated keeping the yard completely clean. I half-ass home projects. I buy new underwear to keep from doing laundry as frequently as before. All of these cuts will still enable me to walk the dogs, work, sleep, and take great naps during the weekend.
Last but not least....I have moved the bed back into the bedroom. No more living room camp outs for me and the dogs. That doesn't mean I have actually put in the new floor. Nope. I am living on the concrete slap. It does mean I got tired of waking up looking at the mountains out the window. I felt like I had a huge hill to climb every single freaking day. Now I look out at the valley. It's all down hill and smooth sailing for me. My psyche thanked me greatly.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Blogging Failure. Clearly.
Well everyone, it seems that my last update was in March. How did the captain of the Starship Enterprise come up with something to record every single day? Honestly? "Today we flew through space some. It was dark mostly. There were some stars out." They couldn't have woken up and gotten more than they bargained for every single flipping day, could they?
I mean obviously we wouldn't have watched an episode of the many hundreds of humdrum days in space, so that is the excuse I am using for why I haven't posted anything since March. Nothing has changed at my house, really. I am still camped out in the living room because I haven't installed the tile in the bedroom. To be honest, I haven't even purchased the tile. It's overwhelming with all the choices and sizes and grout colors, yadda, yadda, yadda. Plus I have to be in town the same weekend that my expert tile friend is going to be in town, and our schedules have been nuts.
I did purchase an automatic pool vacuum. His name is "Sand Shark", and he chugs around my pool during the day sweeping up debris that I could sweep up if I were so inclined to use a manual vacuum. I am not so inclined.
I also purchased 4 bags or mortar that are sitting in my garage. They will ultimately be used to fix the patio around my pool and to set the flag stones that I have. Ultimately....that is such a vague word meaning that I hope to get to it before the end of the world.
On a sad note, I believe I have killed my huge, wonderful pine tree. My yard expert said it could have been a disease because it died so quickly. He obviously has not heard of "Allison Black Thumb". My luck with plants really does mean that I could have inadvertently killed the tree that quickly. I was told to water him to high heaven to see if we could bring him back. Cross your fingers!
OH MY GOODNESS! I can't believe I forgot to mention my crowning achievement. I finished the drywall in the bedroom and painted it brown with a blue accent wall. I must have forgotten all about it since I still don't actually go to bed in my bedroom. I may have also damaged a few brain cells painting and repainting the room, making it more difficult for me to recall recent events. So, there....I have done something. I have pondered doing other somethings. I will forever procrastinate a few other somethings.
Now that I need to start updating this blog more, I need to actually start doing things at my house and stop being a slacker.
I mean obviously we wouldn't have watched an episode of the many hundreds of humdrum days in space, so that is the excuse I am using for why I haven't posted anything since March. Nothing has changed at my house, really. I am still camped out in the living room because I haven't installed the tile in the bedroom. To be honest, I haven't even purchased the tile. It's overwhelming with all the choices and sizes and grout colors, yadda, yadda, yadda. Plus I have to be in town the same weekend that my expert tile friend is going to be in town, and our schedules have been nuts.
I did purchase an automatic pool vacuum. His name is "Sand Shark", and he chugs around my pool during the day sweeping up debris that I could sweep up if I were so inclined to use a manual vacuum. I am not so inclined.
I also purchased 4 bags or mortar that are sitting in my garage. They will ultimately be used to fix the patio around my pool and to set the flag stones that I have. Ultimately....that is such a vague word meaning that I hope to get to it before the end of the world.
On a sad note, I believe I have killed my huge, wonderful pine tree. My yard expert said it could have been a disease because it died so quickly. He obviously has not heard of "Allison Black Thumb". My luck with plants really does mean that I could have inadvertently killed the tree that quickly. I was told to water him to high heaven to see if we could bring him back. Cross your fingers!
OH MY GOODNESS! I can't believe I forgot to mention my crowning achievement. I finished the drywall in the bedroom and painted it brown with a blue accent wall. I must have forgotten all about it since I still don't actually go to bed in my bedroom. I may have also damaged a few brain cells painting and repainting the room, making it more difficult for me to recall recent events. So, there....I have done something. I have pondered doing other somethings. I will forever procrastinate a few other somethings.
Now that I need to start updating this blog more, I need to actually start doing things at my house and stop being a slacker.
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